At last!! The long awaited first compilation of pieces by legendary Tamil film composer Dr. Ilaiyaraaja. For years a private enthusiasm of friends of Angelica (Fred Frith, Heiner Goebbels, John Zorn &c.), this music has circulated until now only on dubbed cassettes, with new material occasionally surfacing in local Tamil general stores. Massimo Simonini finally went to visit and came back with permission to make 3 compilations (from some 4500 pieces - the work never stops). What makes Ilaiyaraaja so universal is his cheerful adoption of much of the world's music and its instruments while remaining focused on the needs of song and the language of popular film; what makes him so addictive is his extraordinary sense of arrangement and instrumentation. Everything is detail with a small surprise lurking around every corner. This is work of painstaking subtlety, wrapped in simple forms - and luminous undemonstrative musicianship - the kind of work that grows with every listening and depends on its inner qualities and not on shock, dissidence or effect. These are perfectly crafted songs with mysterious arrangements and a catalogue of rhythms that are never as simple as they seem. A gem. L